NHS Comedy Show

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Deleted member 4366

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I'm back in the land of the living now after a short stay in the local hospital. It was the best entertainment I've had in a long time. Unfortunately, I had Pneumonia, so it hurt a lot when I laughed, but I couldn't help it. Patients, doctors, caterers, nurses,and the systems all contributed willingly, although not all of them of couse. It was exactly like one of those sitcoms or carry on shows. I guess some things seemed funny or strange because I had an uninformed viewpoint. Perhaps if I could see the bigger picture, things would have looked more normal.

When I had my hernia op at a day surgery, it was the epitome of efficiency and organisation, and when I went home 3 hours after a fairly significant operation, I was left with a very good impression in more ways than one, but this latest experience was the exact opposite.

The only real worry I had (for myself) was when I furst arrived at A&E at 01:00. The place was pretty deserted, so I got dealt with very expediently. I explained my symptoms to the nurse/medical person in pre-reception, who then proceeded to do a blood pressure test. It was a sophisticated automatic machine, and it went through it's procedure. She looked quizically at me and the results and told me that she'd have to do it again, so she repeated the test, and the results were similar (I guess), so more of this constant looking at me, the results and back again. I told her that it's quite common for me to cause such machines to malfunction. She then tried the test on the other arm, which gave a result that she found acceptable, so she then filled out a card and told me take it to the main reception. It had a yellow post-it stuck to it with "ECG" written on it, which was the worrying bit, but it expedited my progress, so pretty handy in the end.

Once I saw what the other patients were suffering with, I felt like an absolute fraud and a bed-blocker. They all had an amazing sence of humour and resilience. The guy next to me was 100% blind, 50% deaf, diabetic, had neuropathy so losing his feeling, and he was **** pink as a result of a recent fall. He was replaced by a guy that had severe Parkinson's, and on the column display that showed his pulse, it looked like a bar of one of those graphic equaliser displays - totally random in height, frequency and direction. Even though he couldn't stand up, it didn't stop him trying to escape through the locked back door every time the nurses weren't watching.

So, my final conclusion is that it was very entertaining and I lived to tell the tale. Did they fix me? i can't say yet, but I'm better than when I went in.

It was really handy to have my Galaxy S2, which kept access to the forum. The slow connection meant that I could stay occupied for a long time doing simple posts to take my mind off feeling terrible.
 
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Old_Dave

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Sep 15, 2012
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Good your home Dave.. If it wasn't for life's trials and tribulations we would be .......

Well I don't know what we would be, but it would be as 'interesting' or such a rich pageant :p


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Old_Dave

Esteemed Pedelecer
Sep 15, 2012
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Which reminds me....

On my last over night hospital stay, the man in the next bed (who IMHO should of been sectioned) got very cross and accused my wife of stealing his cloths... So I had to speak to him quite firmly with a firm promise of what would happen if he kept it up, lol

Anyway night time came and he sat on the end of his bed and started to mumble whilst staring at me which he kept up all through the night.. so no sleep for me


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funkylyn

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Feb 22, 2011
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Happy to hear you are fully back with us Dave and hope you are feeling LOADS better, at least you were able to keep your sense of humour and keep posting on here which shows an amazing dedication to duty :cool:

If it had been me lying flat on my back in hospital feeling grim I would have been reaching for the chocolates not blooming Tapatalk :D

Lynda :)
 

flecc

Member
Oct 25, 2006
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Sorry to hear you've suffered this Dave, but it's good things are progressing well at present.

In the midst of a hospital sequence myself, including a lesser NHS comedy. Had been referred for a left cataract operation with sequence of operation about to commence when it was decided by the surgeon at the last minute that a medication I was on complicated matters so I'd have to have a special hospital referral. Later discovered that this could take for ever to get the operation since most trusts are cutting costs in this treatment area, so I decided to splash out and go private.

Total contrast, consultant said no problem with that medication. The big advantage of private over NHS was planning for both eyes, giving the ability to opt for monovision. With the NHS it;s just standard sight meaning reading glasses. With monovision I get long vision in one eye, standard vision in the other. This means everything in focus from reading to infinity without any specs. The long sight eye was done just before Christmas and with 20/20 vision in it now I can see way into the distance in fine detail. For example I can read a car number plate at 160 ft, the legal requirement being 65.6 ft, but am still able to read average print.

I'm in at 1.30 today for the right eye standard lens replacement to deal with fine print to average sight distance. Quite looking forward to it, given the way I got pampered at this private hospital last time!
 

funkylyn

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Feb 22, 2011
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Wishing you well for this afternoon Flecc.

Lynda :)
 

flecc

Member
Oct 25, 2006
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Thanks Lynda, Tom, Dave and Gray. Operation at 4.30 pm, and as you see, back at home and already using the eye at just gone 7pm since the private operation uses a clear eyeshield instead of a dressing patch. Sight even better already and will be great once the shield comes off in the morning. I didn't even have eyesight like this when I was young!
 

neptune

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Jan 30, 2012
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Flecc, pleased that you are back home, and hopefully not in too much discomfort. Things should settle down in the near future. Also a speedy recovery to d8veh.
 

OldBob1

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Oct 11, 2012
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Good to here you are both well and on the mend, know where you are both coming from as been there and got the Tee shirts.

Bob. :)
 

flecc

Member
Oct 25, 2006
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Outcome couldn't have been better, better even than the left eye just before Christmas. Below is 17 hours after the cataract operation, I've had more bloodshot eyes after a heavy night out! Not only that, no pain or grittyness, just the complete absence of sensation that's normal in any eye, only the improvement in clarity and sharpness of vision showing anything had been done:

Right Eye 9am 12-1-13.jpg
 
D

Deleted member 4366

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More comedy, but not the funny kind!

I was discharged from hospital on Thursday with the bottom corner of my lung collapsed (cause unknown) and deranged liver function (cause unknown). I guess they discharged me because I was walking wounded and the severe pain I had had had subsided. So, I was discharged under the care of some sort of follow-up programme, the first step of which was to take another blood sample for testing today.

I went down to my local medical practice today to see the GP and the vampire, and after queuing for about an hour, guess what? They can't find the letter from the hospital so they don't know what to do. Could I come back in a few days when they've had a chance to find it?

I didn't tell you about the trainee doctors in the hospital that betweeen them took seven attempts to get two lots of blood out of me. I daren't take a bath in case I filled up with water I had so many holes in me. One of them did admit that it was only his second day. I could see that he was struggling in the poor light, so I held my phone with "brightest flashlight" ap to light it up for him.

Then there was a chief doctor, who attemped to discharge me the day before until I reminded him that I hadn't had my liver scan yet that had been programmed by the previous doctor. He then asked me why I needed it, when it was my chest that was the problem.

The most comedic moment was when they brought dinner on a plate with knife and fork for the bloke in the next bed to me. He was 100% blind. He asked if it was cut up in a bowl with a spoon like he normally has it, so, after a long wait, they reluctantly took it away and brought it back in a bowl with a fork. He told them that he couldn't eat with a fork, and after a lot of heated discussion as to why, they brought him a spoon. Any reasonable person could see that he was going to have real problems eating his saussages with a spoon, so I suggested that they cut up his food like he'd requested, which they finally reluctantly did. This took about 10-15 minutes altogether. Finally, they asked him if he needed any help, to which he replied, "what do I need any help for?", to which they relplied, "it might be a bit hot for you". You should've heard the expletives come out of this poor bloke!

As you can see, I'm trying to relieve my boredom by spouting crap. I'm fed up of sitting in bed waiting to get better on my own, so someone please make some interesting new posts, or should I start a new one on whether helmetsare a good idea?
 
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funkylyn

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Feb 22, 2011
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That is actually really frightening Dave, no wonder more people are deciding that Private medical care is worth the money......I only hope that my health stays good ....fingers crossed.....and I hope they find out whats wrong with you, why, and treat it successfully without too many more "comedies of errors" !

Besides all these hospital/doctors visits must be seriously curtailing your bike builds ;)

Lynda :)
 
D

Deleted member 4366

Guest
That's nothing. Back in the 80's, I had to have a liver biopsy, which is done without any anaesthetic. The guy went in with a device like an apple corer. It's like being stabbed as they go a long way in. He pulled it out with nothing in it so had to go in a second time. This time he caught my frenic nerve (solar plexus), which temporarilly stopped me from breathing, so they sent for the crash team. After a short time, my breath came back and I was able to point to my middle when they figured out what happened. Again there was no liver in the device. He then played about with his device and said, "Ah, that's how it works". Unbelievable but true! On the third attemp, he managed to extract some liver.

When I had the scan a few days ago, I asked the guy to look for any bits of a liver biopsy device left behind, because it wouldn''t have surprised me, having had a lot of discomfort there ever since the biopsies. He thought I was joking.

To be honest, I don't have any confidence in them at all, and generally try to avoid them where possible.
 
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flecc

Member
Oct 25, 2006
52,867
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That is dreadful Dave, greatly exceeding the two bad NHS hospital experiences I've had. It was the prospect of long delay which prompted me to go private for the two cataract operations, but the contrast in the way I was treated and the outcomes has made me very glad I did.

Sorry no idea at the moment for a thread on something interesting, the weather hasn't exactly been inspirational for e-biking.
 

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